Ninety-seven percent of the roughly 1,200 tickets Metro Transit Police issued from January through October 2011 were for alcohol violations, which includes violating open container laws or consuming alcohol in a public space. (Matt McClain/FOR THE WASHINGTON POST)

The biggest offense these days, according to Metro, is consuming alcohol.

Ninety-seven percent of the roughly 1,200 tickets Metro Transit Police issued from January through October 2011 were for alcohol violations, which includes violating open container laws or consuming alcohol in a public space, according to records requested by The Washington Post.

Fifty-eight percent of the alcohol tickets happened at Metro stations, while 36 percent occurred at bus stops or on buses.

“It’s a matter of convenience,” said Deputy Police Chief Ron Pavlik. “You’re walking down the street. You go into a liquor store for a cold one. You walk to the bus stop, sit down and you crack it open.

“People feel like that’s not violating the law,” he said.

It isn’t a violation to carry the food or drink on board a train or bus, but if a rider consumes the item they can get a ticket of up to $100.

College Park, Addison Road and Anacostia ranked as the top three Metro stations where the most tickets were issued for all types of violations, ranging from eating food to drinking non-alcoholic beverages and alcohol. Fifty-three tickets were issued at areas just outside Metro stops and 50 were written on buses.

Branch Avenue, Dunn Loring, Rockville, Takoma, Virginia Square and Metro’s headquarters building, came in the lowest — with only one citation issued at each. Nineteen tickets were issued for eating food and 14 were issued for drinking non-alcoholic drinks on trains and buses.

Warnings vs. citations

The total number of tickets issued is small compared to the number of people who pass through the transit system. Metro records more than a million trips on the average weekday. The 450 officers on the transit force maintain regular watch for riders consuming food or drink on trains and buses, police said, but they issue more verbal warnings than written citations.

“We find that if an officer walks up and says, ‘It is illegal to eat or drink in the system. Put it away,’ most people do,” Pavlik said.

It can become a ticket, which can be on a person’s record and show up on background checks, depending on the circumstances, police said. If someone talks back or refuses to put away the food or drink, police are more likely to write a ticket, Pavlik said.

It was part of a weeklong undercover crackdown on violators at the Tenleytown-AU station after Metro Transit Police received complaints from business owners and riders about young people eating on the trains and leaving trash, Pavlik said. He said officers don’t go undercover looking for food violations these days and they have far more serious issues to police: threats of terrorism,iPhone snatchings, robberies and fare evasion.

After Hedgepth’s arrest, Metro Transit Police started issuing written warnings so “they don’t have to make an arrest of youth,” Pavlik said. Warnings are also often granted to tourists who don’t know the rules.

Pavlik said that for “just as many people who say ‘do enforce the no eating and drinking rules on Metro, just as many will say ‘why are you wasting your time?’ ”

Confusing policy?

Some riders say police don’t do enough. Metro’s stations, trains and buses are far from trash-free. Riders say they encounter everything from soda bottles rolling in the aisles to people grabbing a quick bite.

Jack Richards, who rides the Red Line weekdays from Bethesda to Metro Center, said Metro should do more education on its food and drink policy.

“There aren’t enough signs and they don’t do enough to enforce it,” he said.

Richards said he has politely reminded fellow passengers about the policy.

He’s received mixed reactions. Some riders tell him to mind his own business. Others oblige and stop eating or drinking — and thank him.

Some riders said they find Metro’s policy of being allowed to carry the food or drink, but not consume it, confusing.

“It's a strange policy to me, but it seems everyone respects the rule — or they enforce it — because the stations and trains are pretty clean,” said Metro rider Natalie Engel as she rode the Yellow Line to her job in Crystal City. “If I bring even a bottle of water on, I feel self-conscious because nobody else does it.

“It’s kind of nice [to have the] rule so you ride and don’t see chicken bones rolling around on the floor like you do in New York,” said Engel, who used to live in the Big Apple.

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